


Balance of Power

by CharismaticEnticer



Category: Die Anstalt
Genre: ??? - Freeform, Aftermath of Violence, Agender Character, Are those things?, Bipolar Disorder, Catatonia, Delirium, Depersonalization, Derealization, Extortion, Gaslighting, Gen, Gender-Neutral Pronouns, I don't want to spoil anyone but I want to give you all fair warning, Kidnapping, Mental Health Issues, Mental Instability, Mental Institutions, Mirror Universe, Negative Universe, Non-Sexual Sadism, Other, POV Third Person Limited, Present Tense, Psychologists & Psychiatrists, Psychology, Psychopathology & Sociopathy, Spoilers, This is difficult to tag, Threats of Violence, Violence, they oughta be things, unreality
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-01
Updated: 2014-08-01
Packaged: 2018-02-11 08:22:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,871
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2060925
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CharismaticEnticer/pseuds/CharismaticEnticer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The division is clear, between harriers and hunted. And he's on the wrong side of it. </p><p>Negatoys.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Balance of Power

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Lissamel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lissamel/gifts).



> Tumblr user littlemissylissamel, the one who previously and accidentally helped flesh out Breaking Point, has been my idea-bouncing-partner for this AU in general terms; also, as usual, my girlfriend has been a lifesaver by beta-ing this fic itself. Thanks go to you both.
> 
> Die Anstalt © Martin Kittsteiner.

"[Um... if you don't mind my saying so, I've been thinking--]"

"[That's a first.]"

A crocodile and a bird, toys both of them, are caught in their usual corner of the patient lounge. One is under a chair; the other is just in front of it and facing another of the rooms that spin off from it, but making no designs to enter. It's not often the hiding one has drawn himself together enough to start the conversation, and that response is a pretty clear signal for him to stop it before he gets himself hurt.  
But the need to say it burns harsher than any warning could.

"[...I've been thinking,]" he stresses, "[about Dr Kindermann. About how long it's been since he went, and when she said he'd get home. And it might be I got my maths wrong, but something's not adding up.]"

"[I'm busy. Be quiet.]"

Once he has started, he can't stop. A terrible habit. "[It's just strange. That we were told he'd be back after a month, two at most, and now it's been three? Or has it? It's hard to keep track of how much time has--]"

"[I _said_ be _quiet_ ~]"

"[But doesn't it strike you as odd too? You want him here as much as the rest of us, surely... Or maybe,]" he says, hit with a brainwave, "[maybe you don't. Maybe you don't because she's the only one that'll let you get away with what--]"

It doesn't take much at all for the other to whirl under and snap a strong, claw-laden limb onto and around his throat, squashing him between the wall and the ceiling of his sanctuary. White flashes burst across his vision, blotting out the blood red being.  
"[Did I ask you to be quiet, Flynn?]"

The bird manages to squeak out a 'ja', despite his position.

"[Then shut your beak.]"

\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Some doctor he is, he reflects when he's mercifully left alone to nurse his neck.

It's situations just like this that cause so many to doubt that he's one at all. A "real doctor" wouldn't let one of his patients rule over him as much as he does, they insist; he would lay down the law, be able to wrestle back control and use it to push him into place. He would have a proper certificate, one that doesn't look '[like it came from Build-a-Bear Workshop]', as his current superior puts it. He wouldn't fear said woman as much as he does.  
He could fit the second were he allowed to bring it in and silence them, and doubts anyone outside of a saint can fit the other two. Both she and the patients that surround him are unlike any he's ever worked with before, for better or for much, much worse.

All the same, he is real. He's sure he is... almost sure. If only he can get out and _prove_ it.

But none will let him, or listen to him. Dil wouldn't even let it get in the way if he did pull it off. "[Doesn't matter if you're a doctor or you ain't,]" he'd say plainly; "[you're still lying to us about something. And you know what happens to liars and cowards? Or do you want me to show you again?]" And out would come the sharp-ended not-at-all-safety scissors once more, gleaming in the light of --

He swallows nothing, slides further back under his chair, as lily-liver-tinted as himself. It's 'his' by virtue of having to escape from the crocodile - from anyone - under here on a regular basis. He doesn't need to at the moment; Dil is gone now, to fetch another of his ilk. But he'll upset someone again eventually, so why not sooner rather than later?

There's a clear divide in this place, and Dil heads the side of the aggressors. Almost everyone here has to fall under him to some degree, though some with more fuss than others. He says 'jump', they say 'this high', he says 'no THIS high and don't you forget it'. He says Dr Flynn is simply Flynn, no knowledge to his name, and they believe him, hiss at him, drive him to this not-so-hidden place.  
After a while, it's hard not to believe someone who'll nearly choke the life from you if you say the wrong thing. And that's not the worst thing he can do.

Or has. He glances to his shoulder, drawn there by the grey thread that keeps his wings tentatively in place, courtesy of Nurse Nadel. A stark blemish and a chilling reminder all in one blanket stitch.

He supposes he should be grateful for that night. It gave him his own little ammunition for his list, an oft-rewritten entry in the back of his notebook. The dove - or the albino raven, not even he can tell - fishes it out now from where he's backed into it and rumpled its edges, retreating into his addition to the counter-diagnoses. Verstehen loves to insist he is aquaphobic, to prepare deep and full basins of water for him, but this tells a different tale.  
_[Acrophobia. Schizophrenia of some kind. Sadist.]_ And, as of that act, _[wing complex.]_

A door slamming open, a raised voice. Dil's coming back, with someone else along for the ride. He rehides it and himself as the red reptile steps carefully along the floor, pointedly avoiding his companion's face. His pinions, almost like a bat's, are locked tight to his sides, as seamlessly as though they're just decor. But he knows they can spring out at any point, usually when he's beside him.

Does it count as irony, that the one that seethes at heights has limbs to carry him there? Or that the factory error so hates what's probably another one? More importantly, which one has caused the other?

\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"[...and it's all just so decidedly _needless_ , you understand.]"

"[Of course it is.]"

"[If someone else has committed an infringement of the rules, then it follows, it naturally follows they ought to be punished. And I'm not sure it's any of her business if I'm the one to carry it out as well. She ought to be grateful I'm helping her, really.]"

"[Uh-huh.]"

"[Consider one of our repeat offenders, such as Vello, or, or Mary. She has the potential to do far worse to them for their transgressions, and yet when I step in, she simply calls it ritualistic self-harming by extension -- self-harming, Dil, I ask you!]"

"[Poor you.]"

"[It's mishandling, pure and simple mishandling. Now, Rose would never have put me here if she'd known that this was what would result from it. She's far too smart for that sort of thing, exceptionally so. She's already at 13 points in Mathematics, that's a] sehr gut, [as you--]"

"[As you've said. About two hundred thousand times.]"

"[And you should know, therefore, the things of which she is capable. She would never have let me break away from her to come here had she not trusted in Dr Kindermann, and for what? For some other woman to reduce my successes to - to _failures_  when he vanishes? ...Just when is he due to come back, anyway? We haven't heard from him for a--]"

Dil shoots a glare at the crimson hippopotamus who's chosen him to vent to. "[I've had enough of that bunk from birdbrain, Red. I don't need you chipping in too.]"

"[Of course, of course. I don't intend to. I'm simply **saying** that he would better understand my idiosyncrasies as they are - as nothing else. No need for her to mislabel me with problems I do not have because I'm too generous with my pins. After all, nothing is _wrong_  with me, strictly speaking... bar autism, but that's not a 'wrong'.]"

"[Don't be too secure in that,]" Flynn mutters to himself. "[Not when we've had to wrap ourselves in cushions to sleep through your screams.]"

Mercifully, this time he goes unheard, and the two move on.

\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

He doesn't have long to himself before someone else pads over to his chair, either to mock him anew or to empathise. He's bidden a "[Hey Flynn]" when ze gets there, so he hopes for the latter. Still, best to be secure.

"[Hello... sorry, are you Mary or Asena right now?]"

"[Mary. We really wish you wouldn't keep asking us that,]" says the black sheep with a pained look.

"[Sorry.]" But he can't help but untense his shoulders and toes in relief.

The two creatures in front of him, coalesced as one right now, straddle the divide the way he sees it. In this form, ze's on the same side as him, pursued and persecuted; the other one could pick him apart just as easily as any blade if ze so chose. In fact, once, ze tried to usurp the position that Dil has held with iron-tipped claw for as long as he can remember. Ze and Flynn both had to hobble to Nadel to lick their wounds afterwards, his from being the whipping bird, and the two have understood each other better ever since.  
Better Mary right now than zir second, just the same.

Ze sits and glances at him. "[You still hiding from Dil?]" ze asks. Then, when he nods, "[well, he's gone for a bit. You can come out if you want. We have.]"

"[I feel safer under here, if it's all the same to you. I don't upset anyone when I'm under the chair.]"

"[You're not upsett- Flynn, please.]"

"[Then explain why I'm hiding from Dil in the first place.]"

"[We can't do that.]" A pause, a soft circling of hoof. "[We need to see you out right now, if you want us to be selfish. You're not real unless you're out.]"

"[Yes I am.]" He rubs one of his wings with the other, just to confirm this fact to himself through the crinkling of fragile scraps. "[You can touch me to prove it if you want.]"  
Ze shifts closer on zir hind legs, but doesn't actually take him up on it. Pity.

"[It's interesting. You're not real, in there. Dil isn't real, when he's... wherever he is. It's like the light is meant to guide it, what is and what isn't.]" Ze turns zir head up to the ceiling, presumably basking in the fluorescent bulbs. "[Those out of it aren't real. They can't hurt us. ...But even that's not a guarantee. Not always.]" Back at him. "[After all, we may not be, and. Here we are.]"

"[If it's any consolation, I think you are.]"

"[How can we be? When you have to ask which of us is in control, how can we know ourselves? If Verstehen calls us female and nothing else, how can we call us otherwise?]"

"[Because Verstehen isn't exactly the height of accuracy around here?]" he suggests before he can stop himself. "[For god's sake, she says you have DID. She can't even get your disorder right when Nadel's told her multiple times.]"  
No, that's unfair, he scolds himself, shrinking to look at his feet. Technically, the therapist is in the same ballpark as his book. Depersonalization **is**  technically a dissociative condition if, for some baffling reason, she goes by the DSM.

"[Nor can she get any of us. What makes us so different?]"

When he tears his gaze from the floor to respond, the silver wolf has sprung in zir place, tail languid and limp as always. By instinct, the question and tightness in his spine come back. "[Asena or--]"

"[Still Mary. We think.]" Ze puts a paw to zir head, pinches zir muzzle between the eyes. "[That's why we hate it. You make us doubt. And we have enough of that as it is. ...Dil will be real again soon,]" ze says, restoring zir grip on the ground. "[We'd better go.]"

"[Sorry]" is called after zir, but this is futile. Comfort lost, he turns to self-berating. "[...Stupid Flynn. Pathetic Flynn. Mistake-maker. Coward.]"

"[Come out with us and you'll be less of a coward, at least.]"

The eyes of the two catch again, him edging out very slightly to see zir. For a few seconds, there's silence.  
Then ze chooses to answer what he'll inevitably ask. "[...That was Asena.]"

\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"...ja ja, [I appreciate the concern. Well, not like you're doing anything around here. I am, I'm figuring out everything. I'm figuring...]"

Flynn has come out from under the chair in the end, but not before ensuring the coast is clear and no certain little crocodiles have him in his sights. Natural, then, that his wandering should lead him to another of this institute's targeted, lying on his back on a bookshelf as he has done for the past several days.  
Dil doesn't call Vello as many names as he does him. Strange, for both of them are technically in the same circumstance. Driven to hide.

"[...haven't taken a thing in my life, gotta believe me, yes you have. Clean toy wouldn't be rambling like this, wouldn't be rambling. Get you out of this silly phase.] Good riddance."

Nym must have taught him that last one. He echoes all he hears, playing unkind statements back through an innocent monotone tongue.

"A riddance [at all. Gotta believe me.]"

It's a difficult position, being the only one to take the greyscale snake's word as truth.  
At the very least, he remembers insisting, give him a drugs test first. Going by symptoms and hearsay isn't enough for physical conditions. Never has been. But Verstehen hadn't listened to him since she got here, and had no intention of starting then. _"[If he doesn't have an addiction,]"_ her voice echoes, _"[what does he have, wise guy?]"_  He had no answers, though Vello had plenty.

The thought occurs to him that so many misunderstandings could be cleared - so many pointless abandonments undone - if she'd just let everyone speak for themselves.

"[...must, you must, why else would you. Wouldn't be so bad if you were clean but I am clean. Clean toy wouldn't be going on doing on doing anything around here, I am...]"

Not that Vello can, today. He's been pushed too far down into himself. Trapped on the edge between reality and not. Flynn doesn't envy him up there.

...He's been out from under the chair a while. He'll only make things worse if he stays out much longer. So many others will see to that. So he finds it on the other end of the room and begins the return. Hiding in itself is not cowardice.

"[...just so worried about Kindermann.]"

He stops dead still, claw half planted on the ground. Did Vello just say--? Is this a clue? Does he know something that so many others don't? He wheels back to hear it better, to hear more, to hear anything.

"[Give anything for him to be safe. Safe and sound in **Japan** , worried, **Japan**. Gone a month, he'll be home soon. Get his leg, get in the leg.]"

...Of course. As with all things, closure, confirmation, is too much to hope for.

"[I'm figuring out everything. _Everything_.]"

\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It's a good thing he's safely back under the chair by the time a blur of gold and green and azure clatters past his vision - more slowly than usual, but that means someone's gotten to him, so it's the principle of the thing - nearly sending it crashing down and exposing him anew. He doesn't know what he'd do if it fell and broke. Or if he found him.

Of the hearts and minds locked in this place by day and by night, only two have dared to breach the unofficial border. To even challenge Dil with words, let alone pick a fight they know they'll lose. Asena is one, and he's grateful he only saw the scars of that second-hand.  
Nym is the accidental other.

There's no illusion as to his condition, thanks to how much he's blurted out and had deciphered by those used to hearing machine-gun talk: Bipolar I. Or so his ex-owner determined. What doesn't seem to be able to sink in is how that's a bad thing. After all, as he would say, how can something that makes him able to climb the walls and no what are you talking about he can totally climb the walls and run so quick and stop him being a slacker like he used to be cus he totally was and get him so freaking _pumped_  be bad?

The proof he seeks came about in his first week. The turtle, bright blue paint still forming a slick wet racing stripe along his shell and upper head ("I was gonna stop at the shell but I missed and then I thought hey why not all the better to be faster"), was scaling the bookshelf - the same one, in fact, as Vello rests on now. Worn hardback volumes of Otto Selz and Kurt Koffka served as his footholes.  
Dil hadn't yet quite grasped the concept of him being English, so his attempts at telling him to get down fell on deaf ears. He held no clout. Flynn heard him shout, the bare minimum of calm fury from him.

Nym promptly threw a copy of "The Eternal Life" at the crocodile's head.

"[Kid's lucky the book missed,]" Dil said afterwards, swinging the ill-gotten scissors in his colour-stained talons again. "[If he'd hit me with it, no way I'd let him survive. But he'd better not risk a next time.]"

As it was, Nym had difficulty walking for a couple of days afterwards, not that this stopped him from trying. Nadel did what she could to restuff his legs in his off times; his persistence undid those threads.  
Asena (or was it Mary?) either didn't - still doesn't - know as much English as Nadel must to have gotten him here in the first place, or simply didn't know how to approach him; all the rest definitely don't. It was left to Flynn, therefore, to try and warn him off doing it again as he paced the makeshift cage of an upturned laundry basket.

His reply wasn't encouraging, as far as replies go.  
"What are you talking about everyone wanted me to do it!"

"What? No we--"

"Yeah you did. No one here likes Dil no one everyone keeps saying so cus they don't think I can listen Verstehen said so. They all wanna throw something at him cus he drags them down and stuff and Max dragged me down all the time and he got the same. You're just mad I'm the only one who did something about it and tried and break this whole thing down y'know?!"

He knew. Still knows.

Nym skirts that same border to this day, right through the pages of his own book. A danger both to those who pursue him, and those who bury themselves away. Volatile.

That's a good word for everyone here.

\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Crocodile, hippo, wolf, turtle, the hunters. Sheep, snake, a bird of undetermined rank and creed, the hunted.

And here he lies, under a chair, on the wrong side of the line, wondering just what's happened to stability, to security, to Dr Kindermann, and unable to do a thing about any of this.

Some doctor he is.

\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In her office, watching the fray, Dr Verstehen is thinking much the same thing, but of an entirely different beast. Or, perhaps, the exact same in a new coat. After all, what kind of doctor would hire a so-called dove for an assistant in the first place? Especially one so... ugh. _[You can't get good help these days.]_

"[Um. Verstehen?]"

 _[Talk of the devil,]_ she thinks, then turns to face the visitor. "[What is it?]"

"[Win-- Red's put his pins in Nym's feet again. Do you, um. Want me to take them out?]" Nadel dances around the subject.

"[No. Let them stay in,]" she decides on the spot. "[It'll do Nym some good to have to sit still.]" Hah. Like she doesn't already know her nurse will go behind her back to take them out anyway. A needless little secret. But she's feeling generous; she'll give her the benefit of the doubt.  
...That is, if she in turn continues to comply.

At the moment, she's not. "[With all due respect, Doctor, isn't that a bit... cruel?]" This'll have to be dealt with.

"[Tough love, Katrina dear. He probably shouldn't have aggravated Red in the first place.]"

"[Even so, don't you think he should be--]"

"[Punished? Yes. That's why I'm telling you to leave them in. There's a girl.]"

Her next words surprise her, even by the long-ago-met standards. "[...No. That doesn't- no. I can do a lot of things, Verstehen, but I can't do that. That's wrong.]"

"[You can and you will.]" The therapist's own voice grows cold, dangerous, as she lifts herself from the chair. "[You seem to be forgetting your position here. The running of this asylum is in my hands. My word is final. Not yours. And I have many the reminder for those who don't respect that.]"

She doesn't take the bait: "[There's a difference between respecting that and letting you - letting _this_ happen. I don't know how I... I couldn't. And I'm not going to. It- you won't!]"

Verstehen stares at the slightly shaking subservient. She slips, keeping contact with those weak eyes all the while, to the door to ensure that it's shut. Once it gives a satisfying click behind her, only then does she let loose a sigh.  
"[You know what? You're right.]"

"[I am? I mean, yes, right, I am.]"

"[It **is** a bit harsh, forcing you to carry out _all those orders_. I can't imagine how burdened you must feel,]" she says, false sincerity poised behind her teeth. "[And let's be honest. The other thing was getting a bit of a hassle anyway.]"

"[What other thing?]" Nadel asks, as though she doesn't already know.

"[Keeping Kindermann alive.]"

Her dark hands go slack. Her eyes widen, her pupils shrink.  
"[You wouldn't--!]"

"[I would, if you led me to it, Katrina. After all, we can't have this operation torn apart by a little thing like refusal to cooperate, can we? Of course, it wouldn't be right away. Not at all. Perhaps a bullet in the other leg first, to make things even--]"

"[Stop!]" comes the cry, unnecessarily loud. "[Stop, okay, stop! Don't you dare hurt him anymore. No more.]"

"[Then you'll leave well enough alone?]"

"[I... yes. I'll leave him alone. Whatever you want.]"

She refinds her seat, all the more comfortable now that order has been restored. "[Good girl. Now if you don't mind, I have paperwork to get back to. So shut the door on your way out.]"  
The window, the view to the patient lounge, filled with the scattered remains of once-bright minds, meets her view, and there's a creak, a thud, a soft retreating of footsteps in its reflection.

There are some things even Nadel doesn't know, that she cannot pass along to snakes that serve to test her patience. One of them, which Verstehen treasures now, is that she couldn't really kill him, no matter how much trouble his once-employee may cause. What would be the point of it?

You can't tear down the empire of a dead man brick by brick.

**Author's Note:**

> For those confused as to who corresponds to who here:
> 
> * Kroko in the main canon - Dil in Negatoys  
> * Lilo - Red  
> * Dolly and her wolf - Mary and Asena  
> * Sly - Vello  
> * Dub - Nym  
> * Dr Wood - Dr Flynn  
> * Dr Spieler - Dr Verstehen


End file.
